Few creatures carry the apocalyptic and genocidal gravitas of the invasive Emerald Ash Borer, a beautiful metallic beetle about the size of a penny that will likely choke the life from billions of ash trees across North America over the next few decades. NorCal black-metal trio Ash Borer's debut full-length is as diminutive as their namesake (limited to a 150-cassette run) but no less destructive or striking as they hurtle through three tracks in 40 minutes. "In the Midst of Life, We Are in Death" seethes fury with the force of redwoods crashing into the ocean. All fed through a thick fog of tape hiss and reverb, it's eerily reminiscent of late Portland, Oregon, obscurantists Velvet Cacoon, although Ash Borer are far more dynamic in their shifting tempos and tendency to toy with melody. Never droning for more than two minutes at a time, the album builds to hyperspeed passages packed with wrenching guitar lines snaking in from the margins. Nowhere is this more apparent than closer "My Curse Was Raised in the Darkness Against a Doomsday Silence," which at nearly 20 minutes would have been a perfect EP on its own. Ash Borer's debut isn't just one of the best metal releases of 2011; it's a reminder that there are places extreme music can evolve beyond adolescent leather-and-spikes posturing and fests brought to you by Toyota.

Trans Am | What Day Is It Tonight? Trans Am Live, 1993 - 2008 Trans Am are distillers of guilty pleasures, mixing fat AOR riffs with sleazy electronic accents and a propulsive attitude typically reserved for arcade soundtracks. What Day Is It Tonight? covers the DC-area band’s 20-year history with high-quality, high-energy live cuts taken from their many tours.

Various Artists | Panama! 3 If you purchase a copy of Soundway’s wonderful Panama! 3 — and you should — you get two things for the price of one. First, this is a carefully curated CD of “Calypso Panameño, Guajira Jazz & Cumbia Típica on the Isthmus 1960-75” that will keep you smiling — and perhaps dancing — for a healthy while.

The Big Hurt: Lambert works it, 50 blows it, Moz ends it ADAM LAMBERT 's spicy AMA performance continues to dominate entertainment headlines, weeks after it first scandalized the nation — but why does America care what a man does with another man in the secluded privacy of the American Music Awards?

Winter warmers Sure, some bands take the easy route and have album releases through the summer, enticing you to shows with back-patio barbecues and all-night rooftop after-parties. In January? Not so much.

Beyond Dilla and Dipset With a semi-sober face I'll claim that hip-hop in 2010 might deliver more than just posthumous Dilla discs, Dipset mixtapes, and a new ignoramus coke rapper whom critics pretend rhymes in triple-entendres.

CONVERGE GO BACK TO BASICS | October 02, 2012 For most Bostonians of a certain age, Converge's Jane Doe (2001) is always going to be "that" record. But sentimentality aside, the metal/hardcore quartet's latest, All We Love We Leave Behind — out Tuesday on Epitaph — bangs right up against it.

STAYING UP LATE WITH NACHZEHRER AND 212 | August 02, 2012 The physical 212: an Allston room where two drum kits sit opposite each other in malign aspect, occult graffiti covers the walls, empties of every variety of shit beer cover the floor, and a stench of rot permeates everything.

DOOMRIDERS CONTINUE THEIR FORWARD MARCH | October 13, 2011 It's hard to begrudge Doomriders' front man Nate Newton when he stops in the midst of rattling off the band's tours with the likes of Red Sparowes, Clutch, and Disfear, among others, in the two years since the release of Darkness Come Alive off Salem-based Deathwish Inc.

TAMPA RE-EMERGING AS A DEATH-METAL HOTBED | August 24, 2011 People up here in the Northeast normally associate Tampa, Florida, with balmy beaches and snowbirds. But look beyond the sands and the area is the perfect grindcore dystopia: boulevards flanked by miles of strip sprawl cut across a lattice of low-slung houses built on the cheap, monotony punctuated every few miles by hulking shopping centers and big-box plazas.